MONTREAL — An attempt to find a solution to the Quebec student crisis has fallen apart, opening up a vast range of potential implications that could be felt from the street to the ballot box.

After four days of negotiation, the provincial government and student groups announced Thursday that their talks had gone nowhere.

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The students had issued a mild threat to walk away from the negotiating table early in the day Thursday, but surprisingly, it was Education Minister Michelle Courchesne who announced talks had been suspended because of what she described as an “impasse.”

The students later confirmed to reporters that talks had broken off — against their wishes, they said.

They said the government had offered nothing except for a $35 discount on tuition hikes, and was unwilling to rescind a controversial law that sets limits on protests.

But Ms. Courchesne said a subsequent government proposal would have to cut the tuition increase by $100 in the first year before returning to $254 in the following six years.

The government also proposed a public forum to discuss the quality and future of Quebec universities, including how they’re managed and financed.

The minister said the students wanted to reduce education tax credits and even suggested abolishing an education savings incentives program for middle-class families.

Ultimately, Ms. Courchesne said talks reached an impasse because the students rejected all increases of tuition fees.

“For them it was the freeze, the moratorium or nothing.”

There had been speculation that if this latest attempt at negotiation failed the provincial government might call a snap election and ask Quebec voters to help settle a dispute that has made international news.

Premier Jean Charest said that day will indeed come — but he downplayed its imminence. The government is into the fourth year of its mandate and must head to the polls by late 2013.

“Ultimately there will be an election within 18 months,” Mr. Charest told reporters. “It will happen in a democratic context that will allow us to state our case on these issues.”

It would be Mr. Charest’s fifth election as a provincial politician, if he ran again. He is already positioning the tuition hikes as a central issue of any future vote.

And he suggested that the voters of Quebec might not take their cue from the red-square-wearing protesters who have been in the streets every day for months, even inspiring fellow demonstrators outside the province and country to join their case.

“It’s up to the silent majority to express itself,” Mr. Charest said, before repeating: “There will be an election within 18 months.”

One of his principal opponents, François Legault of the Coalition For Quebec’s Future, suggested the premier should calm tensions by announcing plans to hold an election in the fall.

In the meantime, both the government and student groups said they were willing to speak again if the other side was ready to make an offer.